National Conference of Ensemble! (26-27 April 2014)

150 members and delegates
of local branches of Ensemble ! (1) met on the weekend of 26-27 April 2014 in
Montreuil, in the suburbs of Paris, for a national meeting to discuss the
political situation and draw up a balance sheet of the first few months of the
new organisation.

The first session on Saturday
was devoted to the political situation after the recent local elections. The
main feature, of course, was the debacle of the ruling Socialist Party and its
allies, who lost control of 155 town and city councils to the right and the
far-right National Front.

There was also general
agreement that the Left Front, of which Ensemble ! is a member, along with
the much larger French Communist Party and the Left Party, had also lost ground.
(Translator’s note : This failure to provide a clear and credible
alternative to the government’s austerity policies was in part due to the
decision of the Communist Party, in many but not all areas, and crucially in a
number of large towns including Paris, to form an alliance in the first round
of the elections with the Socialist Party, thus confusing the issue for many
voters – an analysis which is shared with the Left Party.)

A political crisis has now
developed. The Greens have left the government (while claiming to remain part
of the ruling majority in parliament) (a decision which was opposed by a
section of the party), and several dozen Socialist members of parliament have come
out in opposition to the policies being followed by the government under the
new prime minister Manuel Valls, who was appointed by president François
Hollande in the aftermath of the elections.

On the plus side, the April
12 demonstrations called by the Left Front and supported by the New
Anticapitalist Party, left Greens and even by one Socialist parliamentarian were
a success. Unusually for an event organised by political parties, several trade
union federations and local trade union councils also took part, as well as associations
representing the social movements.

The conference delegates
were unanimous in pointing out that the turn-out demonstrated the potential for
resistance. What is needed now is to build on the success of the demonstration
by creating local initiatives with a view to a further national mobilisation.

The meeting adopted the
following political text (here in French on our website) :

Following
the break on the Saturday, the delegates discussed a report dealing with two subjects : the Transatlantic free
trade treaty - and the opposition to it which is beginning to take shape - which
is being negotiated in secret by the European Union and the United States, and
the campaign for the European elections..

The
following session took the form of working groups on the organisation of
Ensemble!, ecological questions, international work, the movement’s logo (a
question which has not yet been resolved !), the work of local councillors
belonging to Ensemble ! and feminism. Regional commissions then discussed the
campaign for the European elections.

The day finished with the
customary (in France !) apéritif and speeches of welcome from the new
mayor of Montreuil, Patrick Bessac (a member of the Left Front), Clémentine
Autain (a national spokesperson for Ensemble !) and newly elected local
councillor and member of Gauche Anticapitaliste-Ensemble ! Capucine
Larzillière.

The Sunday session began
with further working groups on the movement’s summer school, education, health,
workers’ self-management, the social movements, etc., followed by a report back
to the assembled delegates.

The next national meeting
of Ensemble ! will take place on the weekend of 14-15 June.

Report by Angèle
Mondini, translated with additional material for clarification by Colin
Falconer

Notes

(1)Ensemble ! (full name in
French : Ensemble ! Mouvement pour une alternative de gauche,
écologiste et solidaire) is a merger of several organisations belonging to the
Left Front : Gauche Anticapitaliste, Convergence et Alternatives,
Fédération pour une alternative sociale et écologique (with the Association des
Communistes Unitaires), Les Alternatifs, as well as Unitaires !, an
association of members or former members of Gauche Unitaire. The new organisation
also has individual members who are unaffiliated to any of the above.